21 Years Ago, Hayden Panettiere And Michelle Trachtenberg Starred In A Beloved Disney Movie

Actor Michelle Trachtenberg passed away on February 26, 2025, at 39. The cause of death was related to diabetes, which was the side effect of a liver transplant. Meanwhile, actor Hayden Panettiere passed away on August 16, 2026, at 36. A cause of death has not yet been definitively determined.

Both Trachtenberg and Panettiere began working on movies and TV shows when they were very young, with Trachtenberg's first major screen credits being a 1991 episode of "Law & Order," when she was about six, and Panettiere's being on episodes of "One Life to Live" in 1994, when she was about five. They both landed roles in high-profile films around the same time as well, with Trachtenberg playing the title role in 1996's kid-detective movie "Harriet the Spy" and Panettiere voicing the ant princess Dot in the animated 1998 Pixar hit "A Bug's Life." Trachtenberg, having a few years on Panettiere, was in the limelight first, but they were peers who both achieved notable fame.

Both also appeared in popular mainstream genre TV series that brought them new fame. Trachtenberg played Dawn, Buffy's sister, in "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" beginning in 2000, and Panettiere burst into the mainstream spotlight playing Claire Bennett in the hit superhero series "Heroes" starting in 2006.

In 2005, however, the two actors appeared together in Tim Fywell's kid-friendly Disney sports movie "Ice Princess." In the film, Trachtenberg plays Casey, a STEM whiz who becomes an ice skating prodigy, while Panettiere plays Gennifer, a fellow skater forced into being Casey's would-be rival by her ice skating coach mother Tina (Kim Cattrall). The movie wasn't a huge hit initially, but it's found a larger audience who loves it over the years, and it makes for an otherwise gentle, sweet time.

The plot of "Ice Princess" is pretty endearing and should speak to all the nerdy kids and aspiring ice princesses at heart watching. Michelle Trachtenberg plays Casey, a science-loving high school student angling to get into Harvard. While working on a special physics project, she finds that specific scientific principles can be derived from figure skating, an old childhood interest of hers. So, Casey takes it up again, finding that her scientific knowledge makes her a better skater.

From there, Casey develops a computer algorithm that can guide better ice dancing moves and uses it to help a few other skaters currently on the junior level. That includes Hayden Panettiere Gennifer or Gen for short. Gen, as it so happens, also has a cute older brother named Teddy (Trevor Blumas) and Casey begins dating him. The two young women become rivals in the skating world, but the animosity stems from Kim Cattrall's Tina, i.e. Gen's mother and a former skater who pressures her daughter into succeeding. Meanwhile, Casey's mom, Joan (Joan Cusack), feels that Casey should give up skating and focus on her scientific interests. The two moms carry much of the film's drama.

"Ice Princess" ends, as all sports movies do, with a big competition and various stories wrapping up (depending, of course, on who wins). I shan't reveal how it all goes down, but given that this is a G-rated, slumber-party-friendly, Disney-produced ice skating movie, one can safely assume that no one gets hurt, valuable lessons are learned, and most everyone walks away feeling hunky-dory. (There's no reason why a young woman can't be into both physics and skating.) The film even features cameos by skating superstars Michelle Kwan and Brian Boitano.

"Ice Princess," as mentioned, wasn't a big box office success, and critics were only lukewarm on it when it first opened in theaters. The main complaint seemed to be that the film was a collection of old-fashioned, squeaky-clean sports movie cliches in need of more originality. Writing for the Village Voice, Nick Sylvester snarkily commented that he was "just as much a sucker for pre-Homeric, post–9-11, semi-phenomenological retellings of the creation myth as the next seven-year-old moviegoer, but 'Ice Princess' takes the theme a little too far." He added that the film's plot progresses with almost no friction, and, indeed, there's little unpleasantness in the story, with everyone reconciling fairly easily by the end. 

Emily Russin, reviewing the film for the Seattle Times, was more positive, though, writing:

"[T]his is a fairy tale, and the geek eventually gets to wear the tiara, complete with sparkly skating dress and knight in shining armor (driving a red Zamboni, no less). Trachtenberg does more than her share of skating, as does Panettiere, which lends a more believable quality to the ice scenes." 

Moreover, one can see that "Ice Princess" has accumulated a cult of followers by checking out the film's Letterboxd page. Over 12,000 people have given the movie a five-star rating by this point, with many of the platform's users gushing about the film's romantic moments, the dynamic between the moms and daughters, and the legitimizing of figure skating as a serious sport. You can check out "Ice Princess" for yourself by streaming it on Disney+.